January 2005 Archives

They went driving in the rain.

They watched it fall down
on jelly-eyed twenty-eight-years-olds in gold paisley coats,
side-burned thirty-seven-year-olds in suspect camping gear,
fit fifty-year-olds wearing thick, graying furs plucked from cardboard boxes.

Early on, almost at the very first beat,
the rhythm section took their jackets off.

Red shirt, tan shirt. Suspenders. Brown towels in easy reach.

About an hour later, the piano player followed suit,
folded his coat up neatly, leaned over,
laid it to rest during the drum solo.

And now here they are -- the whole gang.
They're lighting flat matches in dry marble corners.
Thigh-high boots over too-bare skin.
Balds heads, stylized facial hair.

Then a busload of high school band kids
hauled up from San Diego
pours out all over the sidewalk.
Clarinet players. Trumpets players. Sax.

And the aged. And the infirm.
Oxygen tanks.
Wooden legs.

All rolled in to hear
some jazz sincere
on a wide stage.

Hi,
Per the previous entry, this is the spot to post re the latest chunk of Gravity's Rainbow. For chat, please scroll down to the next entry below.

Note: And for completists, don't forget to take a stroll through the first batch of comments this week, over in the original Week 3 thread.

Thankee, -Cecil

Hi,
Here's an experiment -- I enjoy the banter, but I don't want it to keep us from actually talking about the book. If we had threaded comments, we could prolly do both together, but in this one-big-stew approach, I'm not sure. So howzabout we use this entry as the bantery and chat thread... And then I'll post another entry in a sec right above this one that folks can use for more book-related posts. We'll see over the course o' the week if this approach works.

(In the spirit of eternal warmth and generosity, chat and book comments both count toward mugness....)

They're building a flock of geese
out by the base.

For six months now
they've been working on it,
piece by piece
sun, wind, rain.

First came the bones.
Then the organs, the muscles.
Fat and flesh.

Last week they put on
a soft undercoat of feathers.

Then beaks.

(Honk.)

And I was like:
"wow, these really are starting to look
like geese."

Well, we started this venture with an astounding 35 or so folks out the gate. And inevitably, people are beginning to tumble off the trail. (Well, we wouldn't call it a deathmarch if it was easy....)

At this rate, by my calculations, -5 people will finish the journey. But what's math, right? A poor predictor of the human soul.

March on you valiant page turners, though thy arms ache to pluck mysteries from thy sagging bookshelf, though thy very retina begin to shake and swell, march on!

Around 20-25 people appear to be head down, still making progress, some commenting on these threads, and others reading along offline but opting to forsake much coveted Grand Poobah status. I respect that. And I will toast them when the march is done, with fine champagne in a sturdy mug.

For now, you've found the spot to comment on pages 113-167 plus or minus.

Next week: Let's meet up at page 226 (263 in Bantam), a section that ends with the phrase "...with a war on...." (Sorry for the spoiler...)

See you there, -CV

We're getting back into the weekly swing of things over on Monkey Vortex Radio Theater. This Monkey Vortex Monday, it's Letters, an insta-parody produced by our rapid reponse team, and featuring Eileen Dahl, Bleu Smith, K. Smith, and yers truly.

I remember frogs --
feeding them, caring for them
pressing that spot on 
the base of their spines...

Small frogs, caught by the creek
cupped for a moment, captive, fluttering
released
open-hand.

Huge store-bought bullfrogs
kept in shaded back-of-garage aquariums.

I don't remember naming them.
But I do remember 
holding them close 
looking down

their slimy skin 
soaking up 
against my shirt

and it wasn't gross at all.

Put it in a box and bury it
by the side of the house
with a few friends, a eulogy.
Soft voices and a
turning embrace.

Gone, like our grandmothers
and grandfathers. And not
coming back.

No matter how young we are inside.
How frolicking. How ready
to go to the circus.

But it's gone. Long gone.
Giddy-up gone.

And we never took
a still moment
to say
goodbye.

Saying the word "doodle" out loud --

"Doodle."
"Doodle." --

makes me feel
three months more young, light, and lean
three months less gassy and gray.

Noodle
Poodle.
Streudel.

"Doodle."

Welcome to the end of week 2! This is the place to comment on (roughly) pp 50-113 (p/v). That said, as last week rolled on, a lot of people dropped comments past the mark, to keep up with what they were reading that day. I thought that went great. So in the course of this week, feel free to comment on page 120, 130... Just use a little restraint on spoilers for later sections.

There was some confusion amongst prize-peoples regarding the first two weeks. In the spirit of loving-kindness that is the GRDM, we're gonna count both of those two weeks as one, meaning if you commented Week 0, but not Week 1, you're still a candidate for potential "Grand Poobah" status. Those who haven't commented yet, don't give up -- highly regarded "Poobah" and "Big Poobah" status are still well within reach!

Hope everyone's holding up OK. Me, it's work, and I'm about 12 pages behind. But hell, that's still about 94 pages farther than I've ever gotten before. Mainly I've been surprised how much fun there's been along the way. More like a Hallucinatory Death Dance than a Deathmarch, methinks...

Next Tuesday: Let's meet back up at page 167 ((195 in the Bantam edition) a week from today -- it's the section that ends: "Is God really Jewish?"

See you there, -CV

After nearly a month on hiatus, Monkey Vortex Radio Theater is back with Bobba Bebba, our most ambitious piece involving an alien watching earth TV from their spaceship yet! With script by yers truly.... Give it a listen and let us know whatcha think.

I'd like to try opening a new thread on Week 1 of GRDM -- we have 26 comments on the first thread and it might help us to start fresh every 20 or so comments.

So if you've got a comment to add on the first batch (or so) of GR pages, please starting posting those comments on this entry.

And if you want to read what's already been said in the last three days, you can find the first piece of this thread right here.

Thanks. Rainbow on, -CV

Five minutes after the lights go down
I hear a familiar rustling two seats over.
Someone's making things happen.

I'm a little stressed but not surprised
when a hand in the darkness offers
two white pills.

"No thanks," I say, false cool, thinking:
"I am old dude."

The hand withdraws.

A minute later, I ask:
"What was that? 'E'? Ecstasy?"

"Altoids."

And I nod a short,
tight nod,
as if that was my second guess.

"Hey Potty-Mouth!
     Like,
stop expanding
my toddler's
vocabulary."

shouts my inner, angry
uptight beatnik
to this guy sitting two rows back.

And I toss an espresso over
one shoulder into the eyes
of this small-smiling fuck.

I maim him with
my poetry.

I thunder him
with cartoon thoughts

in my inner,
angry, uptight
beatnik mind.

Welcome to the end of week 1! Got any insights on the first 50 pages? Advice for the weary? Complaints about bunions? If you're on the march, this is the spot to share, to care, and to shout out.

(I should also say, for them what's interested in qualifying toward Poobah status and fabulous GRDM prizes, this also marks the first week that "counts," stats-wise -- the league has ruled last week as sort of a warm up.)

Next Tuesday: Let's meet back up at page 113 (132 in the Bantam edition) a week from today -- it's the section that ends: "tarnished silver crown...."

If you missed last week's thread, be sure to check it out -- a number of entertaining comments were dropped off just yesterday, including an entirely unexpected bodyslam on Kurt Vonnegut, jr.

Thanks much for joining in and see you at the tarnished crown,
-CV

"Live for today,"
  he said
"We're all going to die."

"Especially you,"
  she replied.

It was a short conversation.

Today it begins -- our first few steps on "The Gravity's Rainbow Deathmarch." And I will admit the obvious -- that I'm a little intimidated by this old book. But I can share this as well: the last two days, I went off on a little scouting mission -- read the first few pages -- read them aloud to my better half, in fact, while she tried to sleep. And dang if they weren't entertaining. At least to me. I had no idea there were so many ways to prepare a banana.

Let's make the target for this week a touch shy of 50 pages -- we'll make camp at page 47 and the line "time for home." [update: this is page 54 in the Bantam edition]

If any of youse have any other words orf wisdom regarding the first handful of pages, or good natured advice for your fellow marchers, please use this entry as an open thread fer shoutin' out.

Thanks and gulp and see you next Tuesday and...here we go,
-Cecil

(For those hearing about this for the first time, you can find all the details -- the gameplan, the prizes, the whole sheebang, by going to "The Gravity's Rainbow Deathmarch" category page. In short, around 20-30 of us are going to try to read this thing in roughly 50 page chunks/week. And for them that make it through and drop a comment here most weeks, there will be glory, and yes, the possibility of a free Pat Benatar CD and/or a mug. All are welcome -- Gravity's Rainbow loves company.)

Last night I dreamt that Shaquille O'Neal dropped by my house. He had a lot on his mind and he was looking for a distraction -- a chat, maybe a movie. I was happy to see him.

We talked for a bit, Shaq and me. Then California Representative Maxine Waters showed up, and she was even more beautiful in person. We were both really struck by her grace and her dignity, her almost shimmering presence.

After Representative Waters left, Shaq Diesel and I sat down to watch the movie Sideways. He really liked the part where the one guy lies about why he's so late. And we both laughed at the scene with the alligator in the back of their car. That was crazy! It was a living alligator! But before too long, Shaq got up to go home.

It wasn't that it was a bad movie, he told me. It was just a little bit boring, alligator and all. And he had a lot to do the next day.

Shaq's a very busy guy.